The Wolf's Mate Book 6: Logan & Jenna (21 page)

“Thanks, but you did enough
helping us get everything here.  I’m so excited to have my clothes and all my
beauty products.”  She looked at the boxes containing her lotions, shampoos,
and oils, and the materials to make more.  She was grateful to have her own things.

Her parents kissed her
goodbye, and she and Logan promised to visit for dinner in two weeks.  When
they were through the portal and she closed it, she sat down with a sigh and
looked at the garden.  The plants were blooming quickly, and she knew that her
little sprite friend was helping.

She didn’t see Darlie, but knew
she was around.  “Thank you for helping my plants grow.  I’m looking forward to
using the flowers and herbs to make my own beauty products.”

Darlie peeked out from a dark
pink rose.  “I like the way you smell now.  What you used before was harsh and
manly.  Not at all how a fae should smell.”

Logan snorted from the
porch.  “I don’t stink.”

Darlie huffed at him.  “You
do, too,
brute
.”

Jenna hid her laugh behind a
cough.  “You smell amazing to me, Logan.”

He grunted.  “That’s all that
matters, then.”

Darlie stuck her tongue out
as Logan turned to go into the house and Jenna just shook her head.

Chapter 12

Jenna snuggled closer to
Logan late Tuesday afternoon.  He’d lost track of how often they’d made love
since they got home on Sunday.  The days had raced by.  His first night back at
work had come upon him all too fast.  It seemed like he went from spending
Sunday and Monday in bed with her to having to actually leave the house for
work in the blink of an eye.

The relationship between them
was different now.  Stronger.  It wasn’t that he hadn’t felt mated to her
before they joined in the fae ceremony on Saturday; it was that things felt
more permanent now.  His pack had accepted her easily, and they were like
family to him, but Jenna’s parents were
actual
family, and they had
opened their arms to him far more easily than he’d ever imagined.  Since his
grandmother had died, he hadn’t had anyone accept him, flaws and all, the way
that Jenna and her family did.  It was humbling.  And cool as hell.

“Penny for your thoughts.”  She
tilted her face up and smiled.

He picked up her left hand,
which was rubbing lightly over his chest, and said, “I was just thinking that
I’m glad that you’re my mate.”  He kissed the tips of her fingers and then her
palm.  “And I want to marry you and give you my last name.”

“Really?”

He nodded.  “Then we’re
completely bonded together in every imaginable way.  By human, wolf, and fae
standards.”

“I would love that.”

“Jenna Anderson has a nice
ring to it, huh?”

She rolled her eyes in
thought and then grinned.  “It really does.”

He knew without looking at
the clock that he needed to shower and go to work, but the last thing he wanted
to do was leave.  While he debated calling in sick, Jenna slipped from the
bed.  Pausing at the door to the bathroom, she peeked over her shoulder at him,
her eyes half-lidded and her teeth nibbling her bottom lip.

“I’ll wash your back, if you
wash mine.”

He leapt out of bed without a
second thought and she shrieked in laughter and darted into the bathroom, where
they eventually got around to washing each other’s backs.

* * * * *

“I don’t like leaving you,”
Logan said in a gruff tone, shoving his wallet into his back pocket and tugging
a shirt over his head.  His wolf was snarling in his mind not to leave his mate
alone in the house.  It hadn’t helped that the patrol at Jasper’s pack member’s
house hadn’t seen anyone since Friday night.  Which meant that either it wasn’t
used as a permanent residence, or Jasper’s pack had discovered someone was
watching the house and had just stayed away.

“You have to work,” she
pointed out, leading the way from the bedroom into the front room.

“I know,” he bit out,
sounding harsher than he meant to.

He sat down on the couch to
tug on his boots and she knelt in front of him, placing her small, delicate
hands on his knees.  Sometimes she looked at him and he was certain that she
could see right through him.  Like now, he felt like she was looking right into
the very center of his being.

“You’re worried about me
being here alone?”

He nodded.  Worried was one
word for it.

One side of her mouth lifted
in a smile and she teased, “So when you get fired for not showing up for work
after a few nights, then we’ll do what?  Live in a tent in the woods and you’ll
hunt for our dinner?  I know I appear low-maintenance, but I do like some
niceties, like running water and air conditioning.”

He smirked.  “It’s my wolf. 
He’s trying to claw through my skin to get to you.”

She shook her head and
narrowed her eyes.  “I don’t believe that for a second.  Your wolf is a
sweetheart.”

He could picture his wolf
preening and grinning like an idiot at her compliment.

“Fine. 
I
don’t want
to leave.  We should still be on our honeymoon.”

She straightened and then sat
down in his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and laying her head on his
shoulder.  “You said in the shower that we could take a vacation when the
weather gets a little nicer and count it as our honeymoon, after we get married
by human standards.”

He didn’t know what to say to
that.

“How many honeymoons do you
need, anyway?” she continued, her head cocked to the side, brows lifted in
question.

She was teasing him and doing
a good job of distracting him from the uneasy feeling that had settled in his
gut.

“Alright, woman, I’m going.” 
He pulled his phone from his pocket and called Jason.  After a brief
conversation he put the phone back in his pocket.

“Thought you were leaving?” she
asked.

“I will in about ten minutes,
when Douglas gets here.”

“Who’s Douglas?”

“An older wolf in the pack. 
He’s going to stay outside and watch the house.”

Her brow arched.  “Is that
really necessary?”

“Yes.”

She tilted her head to the
side and looked at him silently for several moments.  A smile touched the
corner of her mouth.  “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Less than ten minutes later,
there was a knock at the front door, and Logan put Jenna on the couch and answered
it.  He introduced Jenna to Douglas, made sure that he understood the situation
and what to look for, and shut the door.  Turning back to Jenna, he said, “Douglas
will be walking around, but just ignore him.  If he thinks anything looks
suspicious, he’ll call the police and me.  You’re not to open the door for
anyone, baby.  Not even him.  Lock the door after me and keep your cell with
you at all times.”

The only time they’d left the
house after they returned from her realm was to go out and buy a cell for her
so she could get in contact with him at work if she needed him.  It wasn’t that
Allen wasn’t a safe town, because it was.  But something was worrying him and
his wolf.

He pulled her against him for
a long, deep kiss.  She sagged against him with a breathy sigh when their lips
parted.  “Wow.  Maybe you should skip tonight.”

It was his turn to laugh. 
“You just keep that kiss in mind while I’m gone, and I’ll be sure to repeat it
in the morning when you wake up.”

She followed him to the door
leading to the garage.  “You can wake me up when you get home tonight.”

Pecking her cheek, he said,
“I’ll do that.”

She watched him at the door
until he pulled out of the garage and pressed the remote to close it.  He
waited until it was down before he backed out onto the street and drove off. 
He chastised himself for the apprehensive feelings coursing through him,
chalking it up to not wanting to be away from his mate.  His mated friends had
all mentioned feeling the same way and wanting to spend every second with their
women.  And he and Jenna shared a blood bond, which was stronger than a regular
truemate bond.  So that was most likely why he felt the need to turn around and
go home.  Right?

Tuesdays were the slowest
days at Jake’s, so he worked the door by himself.  He didn’t actually stand at
the door like Toby did on Fridays and Saturdays to card people before they came
in, he sat just inside the door on a stool where he could check IDs and keep an
eye on things inside.

He checked in with Peter, who
was wiping the bar down with a cloth.  “How are things going with you and
Jenna?  Does she like living in Allen?”

He nodded, leaning against
the bar.  “She’s getting used to things.  Her parents used to bring her to our
realm for vacations, so she’s familiar with a lot of things but she’s still
surprised by what she sees.  Last week I took her to a drive-in and she flipped
out over how big the screen was and that the sound came through my speakers.”

When she’d been so delighted
over a box of candy he bought for her, he went back to the snack stand and
bought her one of everything.  It had been fun for him to watch her try them,
finally deciding on chocolate-covered raisins and sour gummy candies as her two
favorites.

“She’s a sweetie.  Everyone
in the pack is looking forward to getting to know her,” Peter said.

“Jenna is definitely excited
about May’s full moon so she can feel like herself when she talks to others.”

Someone came up to order a
drink and Logan excused himself and went to sit on the stool by the door. 
After an hour, Ben and his friends came in.

“How’s Jenna?” Ben asked,
running a hand through his dark hair.

Logan said, “Good, thanks for
asking.”

Drake looked around the bar
and sighed.  “Man, there are never any women here.”

Since there were five women
in the bar at the moment, Logan didn’t know what Drake meant.  Luka said, “He
means there aren’t any
new
women in here.”

“Small town,” Logan
shrugged.  There weren’t that many single female wolves their age in the pack,
which was mostly male.  It was one of the hardships of belonging to a small
pack.  If a wolf wanted to find his truemate, he would have to leave the pack
and search for her, unless he was lucky enough to find her within his own
pack.  Jason and Cades were fortunate because they had grown up together in the
same town and were truemates.  It wasn’t normal by any stretch.  Many wolves
gave up searching for their truemate and settled with a mate from their own
pack.  After knowing what it felt like to have his truemate with him, Logan
couldn’t imagine giving up his amazing connection to Jenna.

Paul said, “It’s a shame the
dance was a bust.  It’s not a bad idea, you know, getting single wolves from
other packs together.”

Ben nodded.  “Too bad there
aren’t any other packs around here.”

“It doesn’t matter what your
mate turns out to be.  If she’s wolf, then that’s great, but don’t discount
humans or other shifters and supernatural beings.  The important thing is that
you find the female that’s right for you.  Everything else is just details,”
Logan pointed out.

They nodded, offered to bring
him a drink, and then headed off to find a booth.  Logan vividly remembered the
times when he was young and hanging out in bars.  There wasn’t anything wrong
with it in small doses, but he’d gone overboard with his enthusiasm for it,
until it became part of his identity.  He didn’t think that would happen to
Drake, Paul, Ben, and Luka.  They weren’t following in Logan’s footsteps.

Another hour passed with only
a few humans coming into the bar.  Although he was occasionally distracted with
conversation, he couldn’t shake the worry that was still riding him about
Jenna.  Pulling his cell out, he stepped away from the door and called her
cell.

When she didn’t answer, he
left a message.

“Jenna?  I thought we talked about
you keeping the phone with you.  Call me when you get this.”

At first he was frustrated,
thinking she had just left her phone somewhere.  She wasn’t used to carrying
one, after all.  But as the minutes ticked by, and he called her repeatedly and
got no answer, the knot of worry in his gut began to grow.  What if she was
hurt?  What if something had happened to her?

After trying her number a few
more times, he decided that he was going to run home and make sure she was
okay.  If she was okay and had just forgotten the phone, then he was going to
read her the riot act and make her swear to keep it with her all the time.  If
she wasn’t
…

Just as he stood to tell Peter he was heading home for a
break, the door was opened by two human males and a big bug flew in.